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YES; HE WOULD FREE the pigs; and Tammy would be so impressed when he: Randy Cathro – former selfish liar and cheat – lead the charge. He had to do this! For love! For revenge! (And maybe even for the pigs, too.)
But the only thing was – when?
Then he had a truly horrifying thought. What if the pigs got into the Journale Reserve? Didn’t that magazine article say that pigs loved truffles?
Arrrgh!
'Alright, stay calm! There has to be a way!'
According to everything he knew, the season was due to peak around about next Saturday. Then there’d only be a week or two after that, at most. And he knew that once truffles were past their peak they weren’t worth a tin of piggy-poo. And that was another point – he and Piho had better get cracking. They had to get every single truffle out of that reserve in the next fortnight! Then it would be safe to free the pigs. Right! He went to the phone, picked it up, glanced at Beau, put it down, came back to the table, drained his cup, grabbed the farming section of the newspaper and hurried out.
#
FIRST STOP WAS TAMMY's. He hadn’t been there in ages and felt pretty nervous as he pressed the door bell button. Tammy opened the door two seconds later. “Oh! It’s you!”
He said nothing, just held up Boyd's photo on the paper.
“Yes!” said Tammy fiercely, “Isn't that disgusting! Come in, Myra's already here.”
Myra was sitting at the kitchen table, studying a large detailed map of Kainui. She wore military-type clothes and a black beret, and looked pretty serious. She looked up as Randy came in, but before she could speak he got in first, “We've got to free those pigs!”
“Yes!” agreed Myra, “Next Saturday!”
“Urrrm!” squeaked Randy.
“Eh?”
“Errrr- I said: Mmmm! Mmm – yes! Ah ... why?”
“Because of that phony disgusting Arts Festival; that's why!” hissed Myra, “Imagine the look on Boyd's face as we drive his pigs up the road...”
“...the TV cameras rolling...”
“...the placards waving...”
“...the pigs running off into the trees...”
“Arrrrrgh!” squeaked Randy, even louder.
“Eh?'
“What?”
“Arrrrr-AH! Because I had a great idea! Arr-Ha!”
“Arr-ha what?”
“Arrrr-Haaa...” said Randy, slowly, while his brain went into overdrive trying to catch up with his mouth, “...we...,” His brain staggered under the strain, and then, once again in the face of imminent failure, it exploded with genius, “...we don't just drive the pigs up the road, we drive them right into the Arts Festival!”
“Yes!” Tammy actually danced around the room, delighted by the concept. Myra just hunched a little lower over her map, muttering like a mad military genius, “Yeah, yeah, but we'll need to herd them somehow, get them into the main gate, and there'll be people around, parked cars, that sort of thing...”
“We can do it,” said Randy, now hopeless mired in Myra's plan, “we'll find a way!”
They pored over the map, discussing the plan. But Myra was right, with the festival on, and people and cars everywhere, it was going to be pretty tricky keeping the pigs on track.
“If only we had something that we could lure them with,” mused Tammy thoughtfully, “something that pigs really like.” (Randy knew exactly what she was talking about, but at $2000 the kilo, there was no way he was going to provide it!)
“Ahh, listen guys,” said Randy after a while, “I’d like to stay but I’ve got a... a dental appointment to get to. Um, keep me posted. I’ll... give you a call. Bye.”
He met Beau at the door as he was hurrying out. She was bustling in with her camera bag and lighting stuff, looking seriously troubled. “Sorry, guys,” she said to Tammy and Myra, virtually ignoring Randy, “I had to stop off at school to get the spare battery but I couldn’t find it so I took the other camera instead. And I’m nearly out of tapes ...”
Randy didn’t hear the rest. He was gone.
#
NEXT STOP WAS PIHO's. “C'mon, man,” he said the moment he saw Piho, “We'd better get our A’s into G and go dig some ... ”
“Shhhh!” hissed, Piho, making eyes across the kitchen. As Randy came further in he saw why. There was an elderly lady sitting at the table, and Piho's mother was over at the kitchen sink, stirring a cup of tea. Piho quickly added, “Hey, ah, Randy, this is my Auntie Grace. Y'know I was telling you about my Uncle Matt? Well they're like... y’know, ...married! Auntie Grace, this is my buddy Randy.” And all through this he was making eyes at Randy - weird eyes that Randy couldn't figure.
“Uh ...?” said Randy, wondering if this was all about some delicate Waitere family matter that he shouldn't be involved with. “...so, um, is it cool if I take Blowfly for a walk?”
Piho's auntie smiled like a piece of stretching rubber and said, “Yous boys really love that dog, don't you?” They both nodded enthusiastically, wildly enthusiastically, like she'd asked them ‘yous boys really love money, don't you?’ Then she smiled again. “You know, my husband is just a dumb-blame fool! First he kept on trying to train that stupid damn dog, then he goes and gets himself shot, then he wants to get his revenge. Well I says it's about time we just told him to grow up! If yous boys want that dog, then you're welcome to him for all I care!”
But right then Piho's mother butted in, “Well that's not alright with me! Unless you boys can prove to me that you can really take care of him, wash him, feed him from your own pocket money, and he's to be tied up with the chain, every time! Or else he goes back. You’ve got a week to prove it. Okay?”
“Oh, we can!” said the boys, “We will! No problem! We've got plenty of mon.... uh, Mondays, and Tuesdays, and-and-and every-days for Blowfly! He's such a cool dog!”
“Yeah, he’s just such a way-cool dog!”
And that was that. Five minutes later they were heading for the Journale Reserve with Blowfly straining at his lead, slobbering and snuffling and sniffing out every gross bit of dead animal he could find. A happy dog.
The boys were really happy too.
“Oh man!”
“We've got him!”
“Our passport to riches!”
“Our ticket to unimaginable wealth!”
“Nothing's gonna stop us now!”
“Nothing!!”